Rohan Dennis, the Australian former world champion cyclist, has admitted running over and killing his fellow Olympian wife Melissa Hoskins while at the wheel of his utility vehicle.

Dennis, 34, maintains there was “no intention” to cause Hoskins’s death but he has pleaded guilty to a charge that carries a maximum penalty of seven years in prison.

He appeared in Adelaide Magistrates Court on Tuesday to answer charges of dangerous driving causing death and an aggravated charge of driving without due care. He eventually admitted one aggravated count of creating the likelihood of harm.

Hoskins died in hospital on December 30 last year after being struck by a “ute” (utility) vehicle being driven by Dennis outside their home in Adelaide.

Dennis, who has two children with Hoskins, will be sentenced at a later date but few details are known about the circumstances leading up to her death. Jane Abbey KC, for Dennis, told the court that the defence and prosecutors had agreed to drop the original charges and an aggravated charge of creating likelihood of harm would instead be laid.

“There was no intention of Mr Dennis to harm his wife and this charge does not charge him with responsibility for her death,” Dennis’s lawyer told the court.

Dennis had posted a photograph of himself, Hoskins and their two children on social media in front of a Christmas tree six days before her death, with the message: “Merry Christmas from our family to yours.”

The couple had married in Australia in 2018 after being long-time international team-mates for the Australian national cycling squad.

Dennis was a supreme talent who, despite building a fine palmarès featuring stage wins in all three grand tours and spending one day in the leader’s yellow jersey at the Tour de France, arguably, failed to reach his full potential.

He also won respective silver and bronze medals at the 2012 and 2021 Olympics and, perhaps most famously within the sport, held the hour record in 2015.

Dennis is a complicated character who, in 2019, walked out on his BMC Racing team mid-race while at the Tour. On his return at the world championships, he won the time trial title in Harrogate, crediting much of the success to sports psychologist David Spindler.

“There’s been a lot of work done off the bike mentally to get prepared just to line up here,” Dennis told Telegraph Sport after winning his second world time trial title. “It’s a reminder that it wasn’t just my body, my body was always good, it was a lot of work done off the bike with my sports psychologist David Spindler.

“It’s too hard to explain [what he did for me] to be honest. In very basic terms, a lot of support to get me to believe and be more confident and not be so negative in my head, to be more positive about the good things that are going on in my life.”

Dennis rode out of his skin at the 2020 Giro d’Italia, playing a key role in the success of his then Ineos Grenadiers team-mate, Londoner Tao Geoghegan Hart, who became only the second Briton after Chris Froome to take home the pink jersey.

When he announced his retirement, Dennis had singled out Hoskins for the part she played in his career. “Thank you Melissa Dennis for supporting me throughout my entire professional career, all while raising two of the best kids I could ever ask for,” he wrote.

Hoskins, who retired herself in 2017, was part of the Australia team that won the 2015 world team pursuit and missed out on an Olympic medal in 2012 by 0.18 seconds.